Robert Burns the new songs

Robert Burns the New Songs came from The Burns Revisited Project which is a project that involved the writing of new music for the entire collection of Robert Burns songs plus music for the bulk of his remaining work. The purpose of the project was to revitalise and give a new dimension to the work of Scotland’s National Bard.

Burns didn’t write original melodies for his songs. Although it is true that he did adapt tunes to fit his words, all the tunes he used were written by someone else.

Many of his song lyrics have to share the same tune and that just should not be the case.

The Burns Revisited Project is an attempt to redress the situation.

The project was started in 2009 by Scottish Singer Songwriter Eddie Cairney. A total of 363 new tunes were written for phase one of the project. Phase 2 was expected to yield around 150 but in the end, a total of 529 new tunes were written giving a final total of 892. Whereas, there wasn’t enough music for all Burns songs before and that’s the way it has been for the past 200 years, there’s now more than enough to go around and anyone who wishes to sing a Burns poem instead of just recite it, can do so.